I read The Tipping Point and Outliers by Malcolm Gladwell back to back. The Tipping Point was written in 2,000 and is more applicable today than when it was written. Outliers is a natural sequel to The Tipping Point. If you are planning on reading Outliers, read The Tipping Point first. Both are excellent books about what it takes to succeed in your niche.
Bill Gates’ Niche
An Outlier is someone who is way ahead of anyone else. Gladwell uses case studies of a few Outliers like Bill Gates and The Beatles to make his point. What made them so special? Based on what I read, everyone today has a chance of being an Outlier in their Niche. To become an Outlier we all need a tipping point. It’s that one thing that opens the doors for us.
What Gladwell explains is that to achieve the tipping point and become an outlier requires 10,000 hours spent doing one thing. It also requires a tremendous amount of luck, good fortune or whatever you call it.
The story of Bill Gates starts when he was an eighth grade student. The mothers group at his school have a bake sale every year. They buy something for the eighth grade class with the proceeds. It just so happened that they bought a PC before they had software. To get the PC to perform required punching holes in a card, then putting the card in the PC. It started working. Gates was obviously consumed and challenged by the process. But keep in mind that he was the only one in his class who became a household name.
He kept with it until he couldn’t go any further. That was in his sophmore year in high school. It turns out that University of Washington, conveniently was across the street from high school, had the next level computer he needed. There he met Paul Allen who became his partner 4 years later.
No doubt that Gates had an extraordinary aptitude for programming and software development. However a few things lined up for him, but it was, as Gladwell explains, 10,000 hours of focused hard work on one thing that ultimately led to the tipping point in his career.
10,000 Hours and The Beatles Story
We can learn a lot from Bill Gates and The Beatles story and apply to our own niche business by understanding and mastering a few basic concepts. First is that every endeavor requires hard work, focus and efficiency. If 10,000 hours is the requirement to become an expert at one thing that leads to the tipping point in our own business, then efficiency and focus are the key ingredients. The lucky breaks come as a result.
The Beatles story of success is similar in a way to Gates achievements. The basic story, according to Gladwell, was that the Beatles got a chance to play at pubs in Germany when they were around High School age. These were small pubs, so we can assume that is wasn’t much different from the corner bar. Not very glamorous.
The story goes that they only knew 3 songs when they started. Their job was to play 8 hours a day. That’s a lot of hours to play the same 3 songs. So they started coming up with new songs. They played every day for over two years. If they played 7 days a week, that’s about 3,000 hours per year. That means it took them 3 1/3rd years to reach their 10,000 hour mark. Of course there were a few opportune breaks that came along. The timing was right. They achieved their 10,000 hours as Rock and Roll become the hot new thing.
How You Can Reach The Tipping Point
Bill Gates had access to a PC that led to becoming an Outlier. The Beatles had access to consumers. Both capitalized on one thing by staying focused and putting in their 10,000 hours.
Today we have extraordinary technology for promoting our businesses. By learning how to use these technical tools we have a significant opportunity for our businesses. Gates and The Beatles caught the wave before anyone else. You can too.
Those who are coming into business behind us don’t have the edge we do. We’re early in online marketing. Those small businesses who develop optimized websites in their niche will be way ahead. It will be difficult for new niche businesses to capitalize in markets already dominated online by someone else.
The Niche Quest System
I have developed an online marketing system for small, local business and niche products that produces extraordinary profits. The system works! But contrary to those who claim huge profits with minimal work, my system requires commitment, focus and hard work. Any other way is pure folley.
If you have a niche business and need some guidance or ideas call me or send me a note. I can help you analyze your business and examine where you can capitalize and how to apply the system. It’s all laid out here. Start with Step 1 in the process. Each step takes about 2 minutes to read. Click here for Step 1